a place on Earth, with you
by missmelon12
Summary: Yuuri didn't want to die, he didn't. And he didn't want to die alone. The world was ending and they were just two souls, desperate for someone to spend their final days with. A Seeking A Friend for the End of the World AU/Victuuri/End of the World


_**Author's notes** : this is based off the movie Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. Enjoy :)_

 _ **Warnings** : Drug use mention, sadness, end of the world, eating disorder mention, suicidal ideation, anxiety, death_

 _While there is reference to sexual content in this story, this is a nonexplicit version (kissing and such, but no actual sex beyond a mention of it) The explicit version can be foud on Archive of Our Own under the user 'melonbug.'_

* * *

17 days left.

"—asteroid Matilda, seventy miles wide, on a collision course with the Earth—"

The broadcast was on a loop, the anchor's voice sad and dead and monotone, the broadcast itself the purgatory before the coming hell. And it had been on loop for almost seventy two hours now, barring brief interludes that only bore worse news.

Yuuri sat on the sofa of his too cold apartment, curled beneath a thin blanket and watched the television with red rimmed, heavy eyes, because surely it was a joke, they would cut back to the show he'd been watching when the interruption had first come, with an April's Fools or a Prank'd or _something_ , only he had been watching nearly nonstop for three days now and nothing came of it but increasing terror and anxiety.

He'd cried all of the first night, sobbed most of the second day, and there he sat now, with nothing left to give, completely spent, heart and soul.

He'd spoken to his mother already, his father and his sister, even Yuuko and Minako. And Yuuko had been the hardest, because she had the triplets and she had told them, between bouts of crying, that they didn't understand, they were so young, and they just _didn't understand_. And Yuuri felt guilty, because here he sat mourning the life he would never have and had given no thought to the life _they_ would never have, too young to even understand they wouldn't have it, to know _why_.

He mourned everything, but most of all he mourned being alone, dying alone in his drafty apartment, with it's creaky floorboards and cracked walls and peeling paint. His roommate, and his best friend, had left just a week before, to visit his family over the holidays in Thailand, and Yuuri had spoken with him more times than his own family, had cried with him long into the night, in a way he hadn't been able to stand doing with his own mother, who had had to say goodbye to her son via a telephone call.

Because the airports had closed day one, stranding everyone where they were, and in Yuuri's case, on the other side of the world from his family, his best friend, all the people in the world who cared for him, and he wanted to be strong for his mother, so she could have that, at least.

And then in a fit of anger, when his phone died mid conversation with Phichit, he had chucked it across the room, screaming out all of the rage and the fear and the horror, and it's screen had shattered and it had refused to boot back up, even after desperate praying as he'd plugged it in.

It sat on the table in front of him, now, a reminder of his idiocy, but it needn't have mattered because just an hour earlier the broadcast had cut back to a live feed and the sad man was still there, telling them that cell towers had gone down, from interference from the coming asteroid, that water and power might be next to go. And then it had returned to its depressing loop and Yuuri had remained where he was, desperate for the other shoe to drop, for the sad man to return and tell the world it was only a joke, a bad joke, and they would all see another day, the world would keep on turning.

(and the world _would_ keep on turning, after the impact, only none of them would be there)

And that was how far he'd come in only three days, through denial and anger and all the way around into bargaining, and he sat trembling, eyes itchy from tears, body limp and weary from lack of sleep, and he felt numb as he wished, prayed, begged to any higher power that would listen that it just be a bad joke.

(it wasn't a bad joke, it wasn't even a joke at all)

* * *

15 days left and he had run out of cares to give, going through the motion, numb, terrifyingly numb. He had cleaned the kitchen at some point, swept the creaky floors, cooked and ate, picking at what little food he had left in the pantry and wishing he'd gone to the store before all the chaos had started, because he had enough for a few days, maybe more if he conserved it properly.

The lack of noise on the street below, the sirens in the distance, honking horns, all those things that normally made up the siren song of the city were now noticeably absent, replaced by eerie silence, by the occasional sobbing or breaking of glass or the rare car driving by, slushing through the snow.

People had evacuated the city in droves, heaving anywhere, it hardly mattered, and Yuuri had considered it but he had no car and nowhere to really go, and so he had stayed in his apartment, that he hated at the best of times, a pittance that he and Phichit had barely been able to afford but served it's purpose well enough.

And now the city was a ghost of what it had been, was dead and quiet with only those poor souls left who had nowhere else to go.

Fitting, so very fitting.

* * *

 _14 days left_ and there was movement in the hallway outside of his apartment, where that had been nothing for days. And, curious, he cracked open his door to the shadow of a figure passing by, the sound of soft footsteps disappearing up the stairwell that led only to the roof access from there, because Yuuri was cursed enough to be on the top floor. He padded after in socked feet, because he had nothing to do and he was curious and he was bored, and his boredom had begun to bring him full circle back into grief and he longed for something, anything to break the monotony.

He stepped carefully through the doorway onto the roof, soaking his feet frigid in the melting ice there, but he hardly noticed, because the person he had been following was there, standing at the ledge, looking out across the dark, empty street.

And all at once Yuuri was horrified the man would jump, though he wasn't certain why. The man was a stranger, grieving the end of the world in his own way, but Yuuri was still human and couldn't stop himself. "Don't— Don't do it," he called out in alarm, stepping forward but drawing short as the man turned, silver hair spilling out around him, cascading out and around his shoulders and about his face. He looked pensive and he looked sad, face flushed red in the chill of the evening.

"I'm not going to jump," the man said after a moment, in a thick Russian accent, and Yuuri felt the breath he didn't realize he had been holding escape him. "But would it not be better this way? To die on my own terms than from the inevitable?" The man lifted his gaze to the darkened sky. It was a bright night, the distant stars bleeding light across the otherwise dark sky, and there was one of them brighter and larger than the others— Matilda, the asteroid bearing down on them, their death written across the sky so they wouldn't forget it was coming.

And he wasn't wrong, Yuuri had certainly considered it himself. Had thought it perhaps better, easier than spending everyday going through the motions of a withering life, swallowing down anxiety until it bubbled forth, at last, sending him into bouts of hysteria, drowning in his own fear and tears. And he was anxious of the coming doom, but he was also tired and listless and, in some part, ready for it to happen, so torture of waiting could end.

And he didn't want to die, _he didn't want to die_.

"What's your name?" Yuuri asked, curling his toes into the cold rooftop.

The man considered him for a bit with soft eyes, the kind of eyes that must have sparkled once, but were only empty now. "Victor," he said quietly, stepping from the ledge.

"Would you— Would you like to come inside?" Yuuri asked, licking his lips. "I, uhh, I don't have much food left, but I have coffee?" Maybe. Maybe he had coffee, he couldn't remember, but it was something enough to maybe lure the man down from the rooftop.

And so Victor nodded and followed him down.

Yuuri stripped off his wet socks at the door, tossing them aside and shivering as he stepped onto cold wood floors that did little for how bonecold his feet had become in his brief time on the roof. Victor was silent as he followed him in and Yuuri gestured to his kitchen.

He had never really been one for house guests, it had been more Phichit's thing to have people over, and he felt awkward as he stood in the kitchen next to the man, fumbling with the coffee pot. But he did have coffee, and he set it brewing.

And then he reached up to pull mugs from the cabinet, stretching onto his tippy toes because they kept them in the high shelf, because the apartment had too little cabinets and too little space to keep things lower down, and he dropped one as he brought them down. It fell hard and shattered across the kitchen, over Yuuri's bare feet. And it had been Phichit's favorite mug, Yuuri realized belatedly, as he stared down at the glass, stunned, hands still shaking where they held the other mug. And the rest of him was now shaking, too, shoulders trembling, chest heaving as he struggled to breath. And then the vision of glass was obscured with moisture, as hot tears finally escaped him, the first tears in days, and he screamed, throwing the other mug down hard, watching through distorted vision as it, too, spread fine shards everywhere.

He fell back against the counter, throwing his head back, gripping the edge white knuckled to stop himself falling, and he was certain, in the periphery of his anxiety and anger, that he had stepped into the shards, and the pain was there, certainly, and said enough.

There were hands on him a moment later, shaking him and moving him, and he stumbled forward, perhaps stepping in more glass, perhaps not, and he choked back another sob, delirious on his tears, all sound gone except the ringing pressure in his ears, and another sound that might have been his own angry screams.

He came back to himself on his sofa, blanket around him as it had been when the news first broke, when he'd been laughing over something dumb on his phone, sitcom playing faintly in the background. Only now he was numb, body heavy, limbs heavy, throat raw, his feet a smear of pain across all the other feelings he was feeling.

And he took a deep breath, ragged and hoarse, and he cried, pressing his hands to his face, curling downwards and inwards into himself as if he could keep going, keep curling up until he ceased to exist.

Victor was beside him, he realized belatedly, and he lifted his head from where it had been pressed into his palms, his glasses gone, at some point, and he looked at the blurry outline of silver hair and narrow face, high cheekbones, and he felt suddenly embarrassed.

"I— I'm sorry, I'm so sorry—" he managed, voice practically a wheeze, and the man said nothing, only sat with him as he tried to calm himself down.

And eventually he did, and again Victor barely said a word, guiding him back, until his feet were in the man's lap, and they hurt, prin picked all over with _pain_ , and Victor set about them, slowly and carefully pulling shards of glass out with a pair of tweezers and they tink _tinked_ onto his glass coffee table as they were dropped there.

Yuuri refused to look at him and instead cast his gaze up to the ceiling/

"I didn't get your name," Victor said as he worked, hands steady, and Yuuri flushed, flinching with every new shard of ceramic pulled from his heel, body shaking from exhaustion and pain.

"Yuuri," he whispered, and Victor maybe cracked a smile, he couldn't tell without his glasses. And as if sensing his troubles or perhaps noticing the way he squinted as he watched him, Victor paused and suddenly his glasses were being pushed into his hands.

He slipped them on and they were tear stained and smudged, but his vision was clearer, still, and Victor came into focus, face serious in concentration as he continued his careful work on Yuuri's feet, which were blood stained with drying streaks of brown-red.

He grit his teeth and looked away from the blood, focusing instead on Victor's face: thin and elegant, almost feminine. He spoke and it was sultry, his accent lovely but his English flawless. "I know a Yuri," he told him, followed by a flinch from Yuuri and another think _tink_ of glass on glass as he dropped another shard of ceramic onto the table. "Back in Russia." And he didn't say what Yuuri knew he was thinking. He would never see his Yuri again.

The man shifted, setting one food aside and moving to the other and Yuuri dared to look again and realized Victor's pants were dark with bits of blood. "I've bled on you," he murmured, throwing an arm across his eyes, skewing his glasses and driving them hard into his nose.

"It's alright," Victor told him, and he sounded far different from the sad man who had stood on the roof, considering the fall down to the pavement below. He sounded less tired and a bit more alive.

Yuuri no longer felt alive, hadn't felt alive in weeks, even before the sad man had appeared on the television and cursed them all with knowledge Yuuri wished he didn't have.

And then Victor cast his feet aside gently, standing. "Done," he said, stepping over to the kitchen, and Yuuri realized he must have swept up the glass at some point, because he moved unobstructed where broken mugs had been before. He returned a moment later with a cool cloth, returning to his feet and wiping away the blood, and then he pressed two small pulls into Yuuri's hand and, a moment later, a glass of water.

"For the pain," Victor told him. "Tylenol, was all I could find."

Yuuri swallowed them down in a daze as Victor sat back down and began wrapping his feet in gauze, a steady, practiced motion. He didn't even realized he'd had gauze in the apartment.

"Are you a doctor?" Yuuri asked and immediately realized the ridiculousness of what he had said. Doubtful, the man hardly seemed the doctor type, but he was gentle all the same.

And Victor laughed, a soft tinkle of noise that Yuuri found he quite enjoyed hearing, but his laughter gave credence to the ridiculousness of what he had said. "I suspect if I were a doctor, I'd live in a nicer part of town," and his eyes, when he met Yuuri's, sparkled with mirth, "I do ballet, I have practice in dealing with foot injuries."

Yuur stared back at him, unsure if he had heard correctly. "You're a ballerina?"

"Was," Victor corrected softly. "I haven't shown up to rehearsal since—" He trailed off, letting the silence speak for itself as he finally finished with Yuuri's feet. He didn't move them though, and Yuuri was affection starved enough and let them stay in this stranger's lap, because he would be dead soon enough and it hardly mattered if he overstepped. And Victor seemed comfortable enough.

Yuuri cleared his throat. "I'm sorry, about— about before," he wasn't truly, because he felt suddenly better, but he was sorry, at the very least, that Victor had to see it.

"We all cope in our own ways," Victor told him, and in the following silence, Yuuri realized the steady monotone of the sad anchor on the television was missing, and he looked over to see the broadcast had been cut, the screen replaced with bars of color and blackness. The feed had stopped, finally, and now they were only left to wonder with the silence of their own misery and the steady ugly static emanating from now useless television he and Phichit had pitched in for together, the Christmas before.

Suddenly the thought of being alone with the noise, with the empty apartment made his heart ache in a way it hadn't before, and Victor was a stranger but it didn't matter, he was someone. "Do you have someone?" he asked, throat tight, thinking of his parents, of Yuuko and Tokeshi and the triplets. Minako. Phichit.

Victor shook his head, looking again like the man from the roof. "Everyone is back in Russia," he murmured. "I have no one here worth dying with." And he sounded so lonely as he said it and Yuuri felt the pain.

"Would you like to stay here?" he asked. "I have a spare bedroom." And it was obvious what he meant between the lines. _Stay here, please, so I don't have to die alone, and you don't have to die alone, either._

"Ok," Victor said, and that was that, two souls desperate for someone to share their final days with.

In the kitchen, the coffee was still warm, and Victor poured it into mugs, and Yuuri barely trusted himself as Victor handed it over to him, but he curled steadier hands around it, the warmth seeping through into his frigid fingers. "Cream?" Victor asked, and Yuuri nodded as the man opened the fridge and then Yuuri's blood ran cold.

"Oh," he said. "I don't have much food left. I don't think the stores are—" He stopped, because he didn't want to think of that. "I have, uhh, instant ramen, lots of it, but that's it."

And there was no cream in the fridge, no powdered creamer in the pantry, and so Yuuri instead dumped too much sugar into his coffee to make it bearable and began choking it down, because it felt too awkward to pour it out now, after his tantrum in the kitchen while making it before.

"I have food in my apartment," Victor told him, and Yuuri blinked from above his mug, held close to his face to better soak in the warmth.

"Oh," he said.

"I live a floor below," Victor continued. "We've been neighbors for years, I've seen you and your boyfriend around once or twice." And Yuuri choked on a sip of coffee, though this time not from how awful it was.

"Phichit," he murmured weakly. "He was my, uh, my roommate. Only my roommate."

Victor made a noise of understanding, and Yuuri continued, setting his mug down with a clink, giving up on it because it was nothing more than syrup and coffee grounds. "I don't remember you," he said, honestly, because he would've if he had ever seen the man, because Victor was beautiful, tall and elegant and slender, every bit the type of feminine handsome that Yuuri would expect from a ballet dancer. And Yuuri regretted not meeting him, because he seemed nice company, though only part of him decided it was because he was the only company Yuuri had now.

Victor took no offense to the statement and only shrugged, eyes on his mug. "I keep odd hours," he said, and there was something there that Yuuri couldn't quite pick up on, something sad and somber. But he spoke no more on it, raising his mug to his mouth, at last.

Victor eventually left for his own apartment, and in the resulting silence Yuuri felt his anxiety return full tilt and he curled up on the sofa, blanket again around him, though it did little for the cold creeping in from the drafty window nearby. Outside, the falling snow was a wash of white in the otherwise dark night and he stared at it, losing himself in the peacefulness of it all, remembering snow from his childhood, how beautiful it had once seen.

It didn't seem beautiful now, only sad.

Yuuri thought, after a bit, that Victor wouldn't return, had perhaps only lingered out of some sense of pity and had taken the opportunity to flee, but eventually he came back, loaded down with boxes, of food and of clothing, shirts hanging from the sides, blankets draped all about him so much so that Yuuri wondered how he had managed the trip back up the stairs.

Maybe he had taken the elevator, but it only worked right half the time so Yuuri blamed the ballerina grace the man had and called it a day on the thought.

Yuuri made no move to help him, numb, feet hurting from the brief time he had spent standing in the kitchen and Victor seemed wholly unbothered and he haphazardly crammed food in the fridge. It wasn't much, but it was essentials enough to get them through. They would hardly starve in two weeks, even if there had been no food.

They'd still make it to the end, only now maybe they'd do it with a little more comfort.

The box of clothes was dropped into his own bedroom, and Yuuri hadn't the energy to correct him, that the one just passed it was Phichit's room, where he could stay.

And then Victor came over quietly draping more blankets around them as he curled up beside Yuuri, and his last image was of the man's hair falling about his shoulders as he dropped his head there, and then he was asleep.

* * *

He woke in the early morning hours, _thirteen days left_ , and he yawned and stretched, his feet hurting, the sunlight blinding through the window, reflecting off of freshly fallen snow. Victor was beside him, sprawled almost across him on the tiny sofa that barely held two sitting comfortably but now held two spread out across it.

He was heavy against him, head pressed against his side, curled tight in the small space, and Yuuri was far from comfortable but enjoyed it all the same. Someone, there and present and equally as alone in the world.

He stirred, elbow digging into Yuuri's ribs as he shuffled into a sitting position. His hair was stuck up at all angles, messy and everywhere unlike the softness it had held the day before, and Yuuri almost laughed but couldn't find the strength to.

"Morning," he said blearily and Victor smiled and it was genuine and nice and warmed him and he managed to smile as well.

13 days left, only 13 days but they would be 13 days not spent alone. It helped, marginally.

Victor insisted on making them breakfast, insisted Yuuri stay off his feet a bit, lest he tear open the small cuts that littered them, and Yuuri made no protest otherwise. He'd bound himself mostly to the sofa for days already and he didn't see it fit to change that now.

Breakfast was eggs, courtesy of Victor's fridge, and toast, courtesy of Victor's pantry, and it was nice enough because Yuuri had before only been subsisting on water and stale chips Phichit had left, a flavor he hated but ate anyway because it reminded him of his friend, and rice cooked too long in his rice cooker, and some canned soup he'd found at the back of pantry, expired early that year.

So eggs and toast, hot and buttered, was nice and he ate from his spot on the sofa, Victor next to him.

"Where are you from?" he asked as Yuuri shoveled down food with all the elegance of someone hungry and dying soon.

"Japan," he told him once he'd swallowed his mouthful of bread. "Hasetsu," and then the sadness came on again. "It's lovely there," he continued, quieter. "It's on the beach, but it's a dying tourist spot. There's a castle." And it was all the things he loved, condensed into a checklist of mediocre descriptions. "It's nice," he finished lamely.

And he didn't ask Victor where he was from, because his accent gave it away, his earlier statement about his family in Russia enough to make the connection. But he wished he had, because a moment later Victor told him anyway. "I'm from St. Petersburg," he murmured, barely touching his food. "It's cold there." And his gaze wandered to the window, to the bright white of the snow settled on the window sill.

"Does it snow often?" Yuuri asked.

"Yes, very often."

And it was awkward in that way most of the day, Victor cleaning their dishes as if dishes left in the sink would suddenly be a horrible injustice to his apartment. There had always been dishes in the sink when Phichit had been there, and it made it feel a bit less like home.

Victor was joyful, outside of the small sad moments that only crossed his face when he thought Yuuri wasn't looking, and he appreciated it a small bit and made an effort to hide his own grief. But they grieved and it was obvious in the way they danced around the topic.

"What did you do, before?" Victor asked and Yuuri, glued to his same spot on the sofa, shook his head.

"Boring desk work, but it paid the bills," he told him. "But it hardly matters now. I've not shown up anymore. I don't exactly need the money." And it was a funny thought, how little materialism mattered now, when before he had scraped and saved for the small things, the television, a book here and there, nicer clothes, a ticket home to see his family. "And what about you? You did ballet?"

Victor nodded. "Since I was little, parents pushed me into it. But I enjoy it. _Enjoyed_ it, the ballet part, but not—" He sighed softly, smiling wistfully. "Not most of it, but the dancing I enjoyed." And his words said enough about the unspoken unpleasantries of it, and Yuuri could only imagine. The man was more slender than most men at his height, and he'd picked at his food, and favored his stride in a way that clearly showed the pain he was in.

"Were you really thinking of jumping?" He asked, and Victor froze, one hand brushing through his long hair.

And he didn't speak for a long while, avoiding eye contact, eyes fixed on the window just passed Yuuri's shoulder. "Yes," he said. "I supposed if you hadn't come along I would have done it." And there were tears in his eyes when he again met Yuuri's. "I— I don't want to die like this," he choked out, one hand coming up to wipe the tears away. "I don't want— I don't want to spend everyday, dreading—"

And then he cried fully, the tears too fast for him to stop, tilting his head back to hide the sobs, but it was clear. His shoulders shook gently and Yuuri reached out, to brush the hair from his eyes, to do _something_. And Victor caught his hand as it tangled through his messy hair, and he met his eyes once more, and they were red and ringed tired, heavy bags beneath his eyes that Yuuri hadn't noticed before.

"I'm glad you came," he whispered. "I'm glad I won't spend it alone." His fingers twined themselves with Yuuri's and he squeezed his hand like a lifeline and Yuuri felt selfish for his own tears that came as well.

He didn't know Victor but it felt all at once as if he had known him forever. It didn't matter either way, because of all the people he had ever know, Victor was the only one who was there with him.

He carefully did not think of his parents, or of Phichit who had almost not been able to afford the flight home, but had been able to go because Yuuri had covered the difference, because he hadn't enough for his own ticket home but could at least give that much to Phichit. An early Christmas gift, he'd insisted.

He wished he hadn't done it from day one, and it was selfish, _selfish_ , and Yuuri didn't mind being selfish here, because he deserved it, with so little time left. He deserved it, for the first time in his life. He was first, and only he was first.

And Victor was now second, not Phichit, not his family, not his childhood friend Yuuko. It was Victor, because Victor was _there_.

He crossed the distance between them, sliding onto his hands and knees to bridge the gap and he caught Victor's sweater and pulled him against him, into a kiss. And it felt the right thing to do, because he was selfish.

Victor froze against him, the man's tears wet on his face, lashes fluttering against his own. And then he returned the kiss, arms catching Yuuri in return and dragging him against him and into his lap. And it was life again, as he wished it could be. Him, in the arms of someone else, so maybe he would feel less alone.

The kiss was sloppy and frantic, an edge of panic and urgency to it, because that was all they had. Tears and urgency and panic and not enough time in the world to enjoy it or anything else.

It was him and a stranger, hips slanted up against him where he straddled his lap.

And later, _after_ , when Victor was collapsed next to him in his bed, spent and exhausted, body porcelain against Yuuri's dark sheets, Yuuri looked him over. He was thin, rib cage protruding, hips sharp: It was tragic, the odd twist in the bones of his feet, where they were distorted into odd angles often. Yuuri didn't know, knew about as much about ballet as he did physics or rocket science.

And Yuuri didn't mention any of it, and didn't bring up how pale Victor was the next morning, the time he spent shaking on the floor of the bathroom, throwing up. He was a brighter person afterward, hiding the tremor in his hands in the too long sleeves of his thermal, hiding whatever demons he had behind a too wide smile as he made them breakfast again.

And only briefly did he look ill, a fine sheet of sweat standing across his forehead, and he would close his eyes for a long moment and then open them once more and he would seem better.

And Yuuri didn't mention it, even as he grabbed Victor's trembling hand and the man whispered, "You wouldn't have liked who I was before."

Victor wouldn't have liked who he was before, either: boring desk job working Yuuri, who was anxious and paranoid and depressed (and still was, but had an excuse now), who spent his days doing not much of anything, going through the motions of life, monotonous and routine.

He barely remembered, as they curled up together on the sofa, _twelve days_.

And the day was spent that way, seeking the warmth of each other in the chill of the apartment, talking about anything and everything but the one thing looming above them. Victor told Yuuri about growing up in Russia, the long, cold winters, the beauty of St. Petersburg, the beginnings of his ballet career.

He showed Yuuri en pointe, "Sloppy, hardly the real thing," he said, dropping from it, "I don't have my shoes," and he laughed. "But I am a wonder, Yuuri, en pointe. It's rare for a male dancer to do it, but I'm quite good." His accent was thicker than usual, filled with the kind of fond memories nostalgia produced, though Yuuri could also hear the sadness beneath it all.

 _My parents pushed me into it_ , he had told Yuuri, and the man was careful to avoid any mention of his family in a way that was quite intentional. But he spoke about his friends back in Russia, the dog he had once had, about the Russian Yuri, as he called him.

And all the while he paced with all the grace of a dancer, and Yuuri was mesmerized where he sat, watching the man comb fingers through his hair, as if considering pulling it back, though Yuuri saw it for the nervous gesture it was, had taken all of a day to pick up on it. A shame, Yuuri thought, that he would never actually see Victor dance, because he spoke about it with such passion, and it warmed Yuuri's heart to imagine him on a stage, en pointe.

"How're your feet?" he asked and Yuuri frowned at the sudden tangent, because he'd almost forgotten the pain in them, which was barely more than a dull throb, sharper in places where the glass had dug in worse. But he felt fine, honest, and he told Victor as much, who came over to him, pulling him to his feet.

Yuuri almost tripped in the blankets, stumbling to his feet and into Victor's arms, and the man laughed loud, pushing aside his coffee table with his foot, and it was still covered in bloody bits of ceramic, Yuuri realized, as he let Victor lead him out into the now clear floor. Victor's hand was holding his, lifting his arm, and the other wrapped around him, settling soft in the small of his back.

"Oh," Yuuri murmured, blushing, allowing Victor to pull him almost flush against him.

"Dance with me?" Victor asked, playful, smiling wide, and Yuuri allowed him to lead, to pull him into _stepstep step, stepstep step,_ and it was amazing, and Yuuri felt alive, more and more each moment. He struggled to maintain the rhythm, lacking the grace a professional as Victor had, but it was funnier with every stumble he made and he laughed more and harder and Victor laughed too, until they finally stopped, the two of them almost breathless, more from the effort of so much laughter than from the effort of the dance, if it could be called that.

Victor was almost manic, happy, eyes dancing, and it was infectious because Yuuri felt the same, a steady buzz beneath his skin, his body tingling. The Russian flung himself back onto the sofa, pulling Yuuri on top of him but making no move otherwise, just watching him, blue eyes half lidded between thick lashes, chest still rising and falling heavy, their hands interlaced.

"Tell me about Japan," he whispered, letting his head fall back, resting it across the back of the sofa. "Tell me _something_ , anything, Yuuri." He still smiled, though, and Yuuri straddled his lap comfortably as he launched into something, anything, as Victor had requested.

"My family runs a hot spring, in Hasetsu" he said. "It's a lovely spot, the best in town."

He told Victor about his family, his mother and her amazing cooking, his father and his terrible jokes. His sister, Minako—

"She was a ballerina, too," he commented, because he had forgotten. "She runs a studio, now. I used to go there, when I was still figure skating. She was my instructor."

"Minako," Victor whispered, turning the name over in his mouth as if recalling a distant memory. "Okuka—" He stumbled over the name, trailing off, looking mildly embarrassed at his struggle with it.

"Okukawa," Yuuri finished. "You've heard of her?"

Victor laughed. "Small world, yes? I have. She won the _Benois de la Danse_. She's rather well known."

It sounded right, though Yuuri suddenly couldn't recall, so he nodded. "Small world," he whispered in return. But not small enough a world that he and Victor had met before this, though he lived only one floor above the man.

Victor's eyes moved back on him, intense. "You used to figure skate?" he said idly, thumb stroking across the back of Yuuri's hand and he blushed, looking away.

"I used to, but we couldn't afford—" He heaved out a sigh, pulling his hand away, pressing it to Victor's heart instead, feeling his heartbeat too fast beneath his wiry chest. "The town was failing, and things were hard. It was a burden on my parents, even if they—" He stopped and couldn't finish, sad at what could have been, suddenly overwhelmed with regrets.

"I'm sorry," Victor murmured.

"That's life," Yuuri said, laughing softly with only a faint edge of hysteria to it. That was life, and this was life, too, counting down the days to the end. It felt surreal, as if he hadn't long since accepted it but rather had long since given up caring.

He did care, but having Victor there made it easier not to dwell on it.

Victor sighed and pulled Yuuri down against him, arms coming up around him in what may have been a hug. Yuuri returned the motion, sliding hands between Victor and the sofa, curling against him. "I have regrets, too," the man whispered into his shoulder, where he had buried his face. "I have so many regrets."

"That's life," Yuuri echoed, numb.

"I know," Victor said. "I know."

Eventually they made it from the sofa and to the kitchen and to dinner, because it was gradually growing later, though it was hard to know for certain because Yuuri had no clocks around, had used his phone to check the time, mostly, but it still sat broken on the coffee table, where it now sat crooked by the wall.

Victor cooked again, and he was good at it and seemed to enjoy it well enough, so Yuuri only helped where the man allowed, stepping around carefully on his feet, which hurt more after the brief dancing. Still, they ate standing up, plates in hand, both of them too tired of their vigil on the sofa to return there. And Yuuri didn't have a kitchen table, often only ate sitting at the sofa or standing at the counter as they did now.

Only usually he had Phichit there with him instead of Victor.

Dinner was the overcooked rice from the tupperware at the back of the fridge, and Victor had made some chicken, which was nice enough, too nice to be accompanied by the sticky congealed mess of rice, but Victor drowned his in soy sauce and barely touched it anyway.

Yuuri ate most of his, though, not really hungry but bored enough that the motion of eating was something to occupy the time.

An air of sadness from their previous conversation still hung over them as they ate and Victor's fork shook in his hand and Yuuri just watched, equally as silent.

"Are you better?" he asked at last, when the silence was overwhelming, when he thought he might break down into sobs again.

Victor's hand froze, and he looked up and his eyes were far heavier than they had been and Yuuri wondered if he'd slept at all since coming to stay with him in his apartment. "I'll get there," he said quietly. "Eventually."

* * *

 _Ten days_ , and Yuuri was restless.

"It's Christmas in a few days," Victor said, his head in Yuuri's lap, silver hair spread out around him like a halo. He seemed ill again, as he had a few days before, sweat beading across his forehead, face pale and porcelain.

Yuuri looked up from his book, some novel he'd filched from Phichit's room that was the furthest thing from anything he'd ever want to read, but he was reading it anyway because both of them were bored to that point. He felt they should be doing something more, something exciting, but there they were on the sofa again, doing nothing of any importance as the moments counted down to the end, every minute wasted.

"It is, isn't?" Yuuri had forgotten. He closed the book with a small snap, thankful to be done with it. "We should do something," he suggested, stroking a hand thoughtfully through Victor's hair.

Victor smiled up at him, wide and playful. "Maybe," he murmured and he reached a hand up to stroke his thumb across the side of Yuuri's face. "It's my birthday, you know."

And Yuuri grinned, sliding his hand over Victor's, pressing his face into the touch, and he had never had a relationship before, but he thought this was what it was like: Victor and his soft touches and playful smiles and overabundance of charm. Victor spread out across his lap like a cat, long legs propped up on the arm of the sofa. It was disgustingly domestic, the two of them playing house across the last few days, as if the end wasn't on its way.

 _Ten days_.

"What? Christmas day?"

"Yes," Victor said, "I'll be twenty eight."

Twenty eight, he'd seen life for twenty eight years and it wasn't enough, it wasn't _enough_ , and his voice said it all.

It was four more years than Yuuri had had.

And it wasn't enough.

"We should definitely do something then," Yuuri murmured, dropping his hand down, and Victor's hand followed it. His smile was playful and charming as ever but his eyes were distant, sad. They were going through the motions, because it was what they had. "I have something in mind, actually." He leaned down, one hand still buried in Victor's hair and Victor knew what he meant and met him halfway, pressing their lips together into a rough kiss.

It was slow and unhurried, both of them twisted into awkward angles, both of them tired and fatigued to the bone, but Victor groaned a noise of assent into the kiss, shifting upwards to better bridge the gap.

By the time he squirreled himself properly into Yuuri's lap, he was half hard and Victor was noticeably so through his sweat pants, pressing his hips into Yuuri's, rolling slow and steady, until Yuuri was choking back a moan, letting Victor lead, as he had with their dance, with all the times before, because Victor had all the charm and the experience and the sex appeal.

"Yuuri," he breathed through their kiss, lips barely brushing now, and his hands were buried in Yuuri's hair, keeping him close, drawing him back in for kiss after kiss after kiss, until their lips were flushed and swollen. "Where have you been, Yuuri. All my life, _where have you been_?"

* * *

 _Eight days_ , and tomorrow was Christmas, and Yuuri stirred back to consciousness to see Victor already awake, head laid across his chest, fingers buried in the soft material of the shirt he'd fallen asleep in.

"Mmm," Yuuri mumbled, half awake, "Happy birthday, Victor."

Victor's eyes danced and he smiled. "It snowed again last night," he whispered, "It's a white christmas," and Yuuri knew the man knew because he had likely been up again most of the night, long after Yuuri had finally fallen asleep. And he lifted his head to meet his eyes and Yuuri could see the physical proof in the lines of his face, in the dark purpling around his eyes. "We should go out," he continued. "We could build a snowman?"

Yuuri snorted, shuffling upright, and Victor followed gracefully, hair everywhere, the very picture of rumpled. "Is there even enough snow for that?" he asked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He moved for his glasses, but Victor was already pushing them into his hands.

"There's plenty, trust me," he said slyly. "It'll be _fun_." And that was a nice word to hear: fun.

"Sure," Yuuri said, pulling himself from the bed. "It's your birthday, after all. Whatever you want."

Yuuri bundled up as Victor sat on the edge of his bed and watched. He had boots and a heavy jacket and gloves, the works, but he only put on the barest amount he'd need against the chill, not at all concerned about the cold with how cold it was in the apartment all day.

Victor took his hand as they finally stepped out and into the hallway, pulling him afterward in the wake of Yuuri's trepidation. And the hallway was as desolate as always, with it's one flickering light and the faint buzz of fluorescents overhead, the stale smell of paint and old walls.

"We'll need to go by my apartment," Victor said, tugging him along and down the stairs. "My things are there, for this type of weather."

Victor's apartment proved to be nicer than his, though an exact replica of the floorplan. The paint on the walls was fresher, the floors newer and better kept. And the furniture was nice, though plain, but it reeked of Victor, his entire apartment, and Yuuri suddenly felt self conscious that he had asked Victor to stay with _him_ and leave the nicer place behind.

Victor had given up more comfort than he had to offer to stay with him.

A bookshelf by the door was adorned with photos and Yuuri took the time to look them over as Victor disappeared down a hallway and into what must have been his bedroom. They were all of them of Victor: Victor and a small poodle, tongue lolling from the side of it's mouth, Victor dressed in bright colors, which billowed out about him, _en pointe_ , one leg raised high, Victor in a warm jacket, arm thrown around the shoulders of an angry looking blonde boy. And then awards, spread across the spaces between the photos, between books.

The apartment was lived in in a way similar to Yuuri's, despite the stark differences. A pair of ballet shoes tossed into one corner, a glass left on the coffee table, half full of water, a bottle of pills spilled across the kitchen counter that Yuuri carefully avoided thinking about, a smattering of broken glass across the kitchen floor that spoke of anger and terror, the stringent scent of alcohol and sadness and anguish.

 _We all cope in our own way_ , Yuuri remembered, and Victor was no different than him.

Victor returned and mentioned none of those things, still smiling his playful smile but adorned in a heavier jacket and gloves and boots.

And then they went downstairs, Victor's apartment forgotten. The way down was through the same old stairwell that smelled of stale smoke, and past apartments that all felt empty, a door open here and there with no one inside, the privacy of the previous lives of it's occupants on full display.

And the street was empty, alarmingly so, an abandoned car here and there, snowed in. And the street was beautiful with untouched snow, not a footprint anywhere as far as the eye could see, pristine and bright and glowing. Victor was abuzz beside him and set off, boots crunching through the snow. And before Yuuri could fully process the scene before him, Victor beautiful and twirling through the snow, graceful and elegant as always despite the cumberance beneath his feet, a snowball collided with the side of his head.

Yuuri blinked, cold snow slipping down the side of his face, cold moisture slipping down his neck and beneath his jacket, and it was awful. He hadn't even been aware of Victor throwing it, so entranced with everything around him, and he glared at the man, who laughed, delighted at himself.

Another snowball followed and then Yuuri threw his own, forming them with gloveless hands, which turned pink and trembling beneath the onslaught of cold and ice. But it was worth it, because his snowballs formed faster and harder and he threw them with such force that it winded Victor as he staggered across the landscape, ducking behind a car here, a corner there.

It was amazing, the air fresh and crisp, the sky bright and blue, he and Victor laughing as if nothing in the world were wrong.

(but the world was still wrong, everything was wrong, but they let themselves forget if only for the moment)

And it was nice, Victor finally collapsing into the snow, arms and legs spread. Yuuri stood over him, smiling.

"Are you going to make a snow angel?" he asked and Victor shook his head, hair catching in the snow and the ice, damp and clumped and tangled.

"Of course not," he said, his breath a soft cloud in the air. "You've defeated me Yuuri, I've been defeated, and on my birthday of all days, how cruel of you." And he grinned, lopsided and cute and Yuuri's heart melted as he dropped into the snow next to him, snow soaking his pants to the bone. He was cold, so cold, but he couldn't find it in himself to care, not now, not here with Victor and the beauty of a soon to be dead world and happiness that they had somehow found together.

Yuuri leaned down and kissed him and his lips were chapped and cold, his cheeks, his ears, his nose all tinged red from the frigid air. "Happy birthday," he murmured against the kiss, and then he pulled away and stood, offering his hand to Victor, who took and it and allowed himself to be pulled up.

And then the moment passed, because Yuuri turned and noticed for the first time the graffiti on the buildings around them, the graffiti across their own building, _I'm scared_ in bright yellow spray paint across old, dirty brick and Yuuri's heart sank fast.

And Yuuri _was_ scared and the terror was a vice grip on his heart.

Beside him Victor fell silent, gloved hand reaching out to grab Yuuri's. The laughter had come to an abrupt halt, and Victor pulled at him, bringing him into his arms, hugging him close. He was soaked from head to foot in snow and it made Yuuri all the colder but he didn't pull away, and he somehow didn't cry.

There wasn't enough time for that, there wasn't enough time for their sadness.

Victor dragged him inside and back up to his shoddy apartment, which felt all the worse now after Victor's, but Yuuri had no desire to be there with it's smattering of unhappiness when his own place was now cozy with the two of them, lived in with their clothes scattered about, dishes in the sink.

They stripped their cold and wet clothes off at the door, stumbling towards the shower because the whole place was cold but the water from the tap would be warm and hot and Yuuri needed Victor's touch, in the wake of what he'd seen, needed to melt away the horrors beneath hot water and sex.

Victor kissed him first this time, pushing him against the cracked tile wall of the shower, pinning him there, hungry in his ferocity. They were starving, both of them, and Victor painted it across his skin in kisses, leaving a trail of warmth as finally the water began to turn cool, forcing them from the shower and into the bedroom, where Victor laid himself down, pulling Yuuri on top of him.

And the day was wasted that way, but hardly wasted because Yuuri had Victor and Victor had Yuuri, and together they had something.

Afterwards Victor disappeared as Yuuri pulled clean and dry clothes on, and when he returned, finding Yuuri now in the kitchen, he came bearing bottles, precariously holding them in his arms.

"What's this?" he asked as Victor scattered them about the counters. He plucked one up, reading the label. "Vodka? You want to drink?"

And Victor gave him a look, waving his hand dismissively. "Yes to drinking, no to the vodka, I just grabbed that since I was in my apartment." He reached out and pulled one bottle aside, plucking the vodka from Yuuri and pressing it into his hands instead. It was wine, an elegant bottle burnished deep purple, with an equally fancy label, wax sealing the cork closed.

"This looks expensive," he said and Victor grinned, pressing a finger to his mouth in delight.

"It _is_ ," he said. "And it was a gift, I've been saving it for something special. It's merlot, my favorite."

Yuuri frowned, setting it aside. "Today is hardly special," he said and Victor looked horrified, gasping dramatically, and Yuuri realized he had forgotten himself and he rolled his eyes at the reaction.

"Today is plenty special!" Victor exclaimed, setting about the bottle, peeling back the wax with a practiced motion. "It's my birthday, after all. And it's christmas," and they had too little days left for this one not to be especially special, but Victor didn't say that though Yuuri knew they were both thinking it. It was his birthday, his _last_ birthday. And it was Christmas, the very last Christmas. "Hmm, do you have a corkscrew?" He rifled through drawers with hardly a thought, brow furrowed.

"No," Yuuri said, because he was hardly a wine drinker, the fanciest thing he owned was a blender, which more often than not sat tucked into a cabinet, unused.

Victor sighed and grabbed up a small knife, pressing it down the side of the cork with a quick motion, his hand deft and steady (where it had been so unsteady lately,) and Yuuri watched and thought there was no end to the hidden depths of the man, who stood there barefoot, in ill fitting clothing, rumpled, yet stood opening a bottle of wine that Yuuri suspected was worth more than he made in a month.

The cork popped off with a simple motion, and Yuuri could smell it's fragrance drifting out, earthy and aromatic. Victor pulled cups from another cabinet and poured them each a glass, and it was hilarious to be drinking expensive wine out of Yuuri's set of plastic cups. "And the vodka," Victor said, handing over Yuuri's cup, "Is for when this doesn't do the trick."

And Yuuri understood well enough. They weren't going to drink, they were going to _drink_.

He downed the wine quickly enough, because it wasn't all that great for it's expense, and Victor hardly nursed it, either, making a face. "Ahh, of course it's a disappointment," he chuckled. "These things always are, when so much money is put into trying to make them special."

And it was a gorgeous metaphor for the day, special but cheapened by the effort to make it special when everyday henceforth would be as special as the last, one last day, one _less_ day, special but spent doing not much of anything as the clock ticked down to their doom.

And that was life, now.

Yuuri was tipsy by the end of the second glass, ahead of Victor, who gladly poured him the last of it and started on the vodka himself, mixing it with something or other he pulled from the fridge, something likely from his own apartment because Yuuri hardly kept the kind of things one mixed with alcohol to make it tolerable.

It was nice and the feeling was a bubble of warmth within him as he finally made it to the couch, falling onto it, nearly sloshing his glass, which Victor plucked from his hands before he could paint the couch purple-red with it. "Thanks," he giggled and it was weird, to giggle, and Victor handed him his drink back, settling in next to him.

" Victor," he said breathily, falling into him, and Victor smiled his own tipsy smile. "Victor, you're wonderful and you're so pretty. You're the prettiest."

Victor's laugh was a symphony, delicate but bright and Yuuri felt warm, so very warm, as he snuggled up beside him. And he was maybe approaching drunk and maybe somewhere closer to acceptance of their situation than he had been before. It felt real but it felt more as if it didn't matter. "We all die," he whispered, and Victor stiffened beside him, arm tense where he had thrown it around Yuuri's shoulder. "We're just going to die sooner."

He could no longer see Victor's face with how he was slouched, but he could see the way his hand tightened around his drink.

"And maybe," he continued, staggering over his words. "Maybe- Maybe this is a blessing, to know it's coming." He drew in a ragged breath but he wasn't sad, he wasn't. "Now we can use our time, instead of wasting it."

Victor made a small noise he couldn't quite put meaning to, but he relaxed a bit and Yuuri liked that, pressed himself closer into the man. And his drink was gone, he realized as he curled fingers against the man's chest, Victor must have taken it from him.

"I regret not meeting you sooner, Yuuri," Victor said softly and Yuuri suddenly found his eyes damp, but he wasn't sad.

"I have so many regrets," Yuuri whispered, and Victor turned, catching his chin in long slender fingers, raising his head up to bring their faces close, meeting his eyes.

"None of that matters, now," Victor told him. "There will always be regrets. That's life."

Yuuri heaved out a sigh. "I know," he murmured. "I know. But I wasn't happy, and I regret not letting myself be happy."

"I wasn't happy either," Victor echoed. "I hated my career, I hate it here, in the states, and I only ever wanted to go home, to Russia" His own voice had a tilt to it that told Yuuri he was in much the same state as him, now. "But I couldn't go back, because my parents are there, and because it wasn't safe, and—" He laughed, suddenly, and it was so sudden against the somber note of his voice that Yuuri frowned, confused. "I hate my hair," he said, reaching up and tangling his finger in it. "I hate it, I've hated it for so long, but I had to look the part, always, if I wanted roles, and I—"

Yuuri reached up and dragged his own hands through Victor's hair, suddenly guilty with how much he loved it.

"I haven't been allowed agency over myself in so long," Victor whispered. "I haven't been able to be who I wanted to be."

"Are you who you want to be now?" Yuuri asked, dropping his hand back to Victor's chest, to his heart, which raced in his chest.

"Yes," Victor breathed. "Yes, finally."

And the next morning, _seven days_ , Yuuri woke to Victor gone, and he stumbled from his bed, hungover and achy and _tired_ , and yes, he had regrets, but in his early morning grogginess all of those regrets were drinking so much the night before.

He found Victor in the kitchen, leaning against the counter, lost in thought and eyes on the ceiling, mug of something steaming drifting the floral scent of chocolate his way. And Yuuri's breath caught in his throat because Victor's hair—

"It's gone," he whispered, standing in the entryway to the kitchen, and Victor started noticeably, looking over at him. He reached up a shaking hand and combed his fingers through it, and strands fell free. It was short, so short, with a messy fringe over one eye. "You cut it off."

Victor smiled and took a sip of his drink. "I did," he said, and he sounded free and so so relieved.

Yuuri stepped over and slotted himself between Victor's legs, reaching up and brushing the fringe of hair back. Victor smiled wider and dropped his free hand down to catch Yuuri's hip, pulling him properly against him. "It's a bit messy," Yuuri said, but he smiled as well.

The man shrugged and held out his mug for Yuuri to take. He sniffed it and it smelled of sweet and decadence and Yuuri took a sip and it was bland as water. He made a face. "Is this supposed to be hot chocolate?" he asked, bewildered and Victor laughed.

"I suppose so," he told him, taking the mug back, moving it slowly so that the liquid swirled around the cup. "Found a packet buried at the back of your pantry. I think it's out of date."

"Of course it is," Yuuri murmured, sliding around to lean against the counter next to Victor, dragging a hand through his own, messy hair.

The stood there in silence, Yuuri's feet throbbing, though the pain was now a far cry from what it had been the first few days, Victor taking the occasional sip of his 'hot chocolate,' both of them lost to their own thoughts.

"You know," Victor said, "The power probably won't be on much longer." And it was their first proper mention of the inevitable in days, Victor's gaze on the fluorescent light in his kitchen. "And the water will likely go out soon."

Did it matter, Yuuri thought, did it really matter?

It did, and they spent the day foraging for containers to store water in (tupperware with loose fitting lids, the vodka bottle, Victor sadly pouring the last of it down the drain, the empty wine bottle, an expensive vintage now resolved to holding water, every large bowl he could find in his cabinet) until the counters were littered with a storage of water.

It looked positively ridiculous, but they had seven days, _seven days_ , and the water could go out at any time, and they might both die of dehydration before the actual end.

Victor was cheerful the whole time, as if preparing for the end of the world was something he did all the time. He hummed as he neatly spread out the containers, sang a Russian lullaby to Yuuri, one from his childhood.

And then they did inventory, as Victor called it, assessing what food they had left, what should be held off for eating once the power was out (canned soup, packs of instant ramen, dry cereal) and what they should eat sooner (the tupperware of rice, barely good, the last few eggs.)

"I think we'll make it," Victor said at last, looking out over the kitchen, now a mess of bottles and tupperware and tin cans.

And it was funny, because they weren't really going to make it.

And the next day, the electricity wasn't working when they woke up. _Six_ days and it was the home stretch, but the water worked, at least. And the two of them spent the day huddled beneath too many blankets, because if his apartment had been cold before, it was slowly getting colder, frigid now where it had only been chilly before.

But Victor had retained his cheerful facade, entertaining Yuuri with Russian jokes that translated poorly into English, and Yuuri did the same, vice versa, teaching him phrases in Japanese that Victor butchered in his attempts at them, losing the finesse of the language in his accent. But Yuuri did just as poorly with Russian, and they laughed.

And then, _four days_ , he turned on the water and it ran until it fizzled, pipes clanking noisily. And Victor was no longer cheerful, had turned somber and sad, fake smiles dropping from his face the moment he thought Yuuri wasn't looking.

By now the apartment was as cold as it was outside, and they walked about in layers of sweaters, eating cold soup for breakfast, and crunching at hard instant noodles for dinner. And Yuuri found himself exhausted with thinking of the days, of counting down the moments, the minutes, the hours, that he had left. That _they_ had left. Together.

And then, _three days_ , and Yuuri woke from his spot on the sofa to see the fuzzy outline of Victor at the door. He frowned as he fumbled for his glasses, calling out to him, and Victor froze as he finally came into focus. "Where are you— Where are you going?" he asked, throat tight.

Victor didn't spare him a glance, stood with his back to him, hand curled around the door knob. "To the roof," he whispered quietly, and Yuuri's heart skipped a beat and he scrambled from his nest of blankets and into the cold chill.

"Victor," he said, almost pleading. "Victor—" He let out a long breath, curling cold fingers into the hem of his shirt. "Are you going to—"

Victor turned to look at him, then, and he had been crying, Yuuri could tell, his eyes red ringed and swollen, tears flushed from long shed tears. He hid it behind a smile. "Come with me?" he whispered, and Yuuri slipped on his shoes and stumbled over to him, snatching up his wrist before he could make it out of the door.

"Victor," he hissed, angry, squeezing his thin wrist hard enough it must have hurt him. "Please, tell me you're not going to jump."

Victor looked at him as if he himself didn't know the answer to that question, but at long last he dropped the facade, let the fake smile that never reached his eyes fall from his face. "I'm not going to," he said softly, and Yuuri followed him from the apartment.

They held hands as they ascended the stairs, stepping out into bright sunshine. It was strangely warm, and the snow had long since melted, leaving puddles all over the roof. And Matilda burned a bright spot above them, visible in the early morning, hanging in the sky like a second sun. Their death, smiling down at them.

Suddenly jumping seemed appealing. He squeezed Victor's hand tight, instead, the man brushing his thumb gently over Yuuri's knuckles. And Yuuri didn't doubt for a moment that Victor had intended to jump, if he had come up alone. Because they were both of them selfish, and they deserved to be.

Victor cried when they went back down, curling beneath piles of blankets in his bed, and Yuuri let him curl against him, crying as well, and they spent too much of their final moments that way, sobbing and shaking and praying to _whatever_ that this wasn't really it.

But it had long since passed the bad joke territory. It was real.

But they had each other, in those final moments. They had a friend, for the end, and Yuuri had never been so thankful for anything in his entire life, for Victor.

And the tears that night became tears the next night, with barely a day left, if even, because they didn't know, had no timeframe for impact. The broadcast had shut off long before that had come up, but it would be soon, it would be so soon, and Yuuri curled up next to Victor, sobbing, hysterical, at last, because that was it. This was it.

"Shh," Victor whispered, hand combing through Yuuri's hair, which fell messy and too long into his eyes. He trembled against Victor's chest, hands curled into his shirt, eyes dampening the material. And his heart raced, because this was it, this was _it_. He was going to die.

"I don't— I don't wanna die," he gasped out, voice cracking. "I don't wanna—"

"Shh," Victor murmured again, pulling Yuuri closer, curling around him. "I'm here, and—" He drew a ragged breath that shuddered through his chest and against Yuuri's face. "And I'll be here when you wake up. I'll— I'll be here."

And Yuuri knew Victor was crying his own tears, could feel the way the man shook, the way his heart beat a staccato against him, where his face was pressed against his chest.

"Promise me," Yuuri whispered. " _Promise_ me."

"I promise," Victor choked out, arms tightening around him. "I promise, Yuuri."

And then Yuuri closed his eyes.


End file.
